Healing the wound of separation

“Healing the Wound of Separation” is this year’s theme as we begin our journey around the sun at the Autumnal Equinox.

The idea comes from Spiritual Ecology, which understands our current ecological, political, and cultural crises as extensions of a deeper collective spiritual crisis: the wound of separation. Separation from Nature. Separation from the Divine. Separation from one another and from the other-than-human beings with whom we share this Earth.

At the heart of Spiritual Ecology is a very simple understanding that we are Nature in human form. Just as the tree is Nature in tree form and the chickadee is Nature in chickadee form, we are Nature in human form. We are subject to the same laws of Nature as all of Life on Earth.

But somehow over the course of the last 500 years or so, we forgot. We began to experience ourselves as separate from and dominant over Nature rather than as participants within her. Nature became something outside of us, a resource, something we visit, use, admire, manage, protect, or exploit, rather than something we are.

The Taoist Five Element System gives us a very useful lens through which to begin to remember and experience ourselves as Nature in human form. It helps us reweave ourselves back into the Web of Life.

It is perhaps no accident that in some spiritual traditions, the turning into Autumn also marks the beginning of a new year. There is a recognition here that a new cycle can begin not with growth and expansion, but with harvest, taking stock, and deciding what is worth carrying forward.

What does that actually mean?

Look around at what is happening right now. In Autumn, the days grow shorter and temperatures begin to cool as there is less energy from the sun coming in each day. In other words, the energy coming in is descending. Trees turn color and drop their leaves in response to this descending energy of the season. Plants stop putting their energy into flowering and begin making seed. Birds migrate south. Sap begins moving down into the roots.

Nature is responding to a change in the energetic movement of the season, each species in its own way. So how do we experience that movement in ourselves? How does that same descending energy move us?

This is where the Five Element system becomes particularly interesting, because it doesn't separate what is happening in the natural world from what is happening within the human body, mind, and spirit.

The Five Element Phase that gives us Autumn is called Metal. Metal is the movement of energy downward, and we see this descending movement everywhere in Autumn. In plants, it transforms the outward expression of summer flowers into the concentrated potential of seeds. And in humans, one of the ways this energy expresses itself is through harvest.

For most of human history, Autumn was literally the time to gather and store what was needed to survive the winter. Most of us no longer harvest our own food and fill a root cellar for the months ahead, but the impulse toward harvest and storage is still there. It simply shows up in other ways.

Autumn is a natural time to look through the different aspects of your day-to-day life and sort out what has value to you and will carry you through the winter. What is worth keeping? What will feed you through the winter on the level of body, mind and spirit? Where are you spending resources that you no longer want to spend? What has completed its usefulness and can be released?

This is a time to create more order and clearer boundaries around how you expend your resources. It is a time to simplify, organize and decide what is important enough to carry forward. It is also a time to clear out the piles of stuff that have accumulated in your living and working space.

That sorting is a kind of harvest: keeping what is valuable and letting go of the rest. Separating the wheat from the chaff.

Autumn/Metal Phase energy has the resonance of grief.

The experience of the descending energy of Autumn as it moves through our emotions is a feeling we recognize as grief or, in its milder form, melancholy. In Nature, things are dying back. Leaves fall. Flowers die. Growth slows. What was alive and vibrant only a short time ago begins to fade. That dying back resonates with our own experiences of loss.

Our personal losses can begin to percolate a little more strongly at this time of year. The death of someone we loved. The ending of a relationship. The loss of a job, a home, a role, a dream, a period of our lives. Anything we have experienced as loss may begin to make itself known again.

There is a beautiful progression in Nature that is expressed in the Five Elements. Summer, the Fire Phase, is associated with the Heart and the emotions of love and joy. As Summer moves into Autumn, love and joy move into loss and grief. Grief is the natural outcome of having loved. We grieve because someone or something mattered to us. We grieve because we have lost something of value. This is the way of things.

So when an old loss begins to percolate again in Autumn, it doesn't necessarily mean we have gone backwards or failed to resolve something. The season is resonating with the grief that is already part of us and bringing it forward again. It is another opportunity for emotional composting, another chance to let some of what we have carried break down, change form and return to the larger cycle.

The Lung and Colon: receiving and releasing

The organs associated with the Metal Phase are the Lung and Colon. Both participate in the descending movement of Metal, and this is another place where we can see that what is happening in Nature is also happening within us.

The descending movement is probably easiest to see in the Colon. The Colon needs to descend. When it doesn't, we are constipated. Its job is to release the physical products of digestion that the body no longer needs. But Five Element medicine doesn't stop at the physical function of an organ. The same energetic movement can be seen on the level of mind and spirit. The Colon represents our capacity to release what is no longer needed: possessions, commitments, habits, ways of living and sometimes relationships that have completed their usefulness.

The descending movement of the Lung may be less obvious. When you breathe in, the diaphragm contracts and descends, creating negative pressure that allows the lungs to expand and receive the breath.

The Lung receives what is new. This is why the word inspiration is so wonderful here. To inspire literally means to breathe in. We receive inspiration through the organ that inspires.

The Lung and Colon together create one of the essential rhythms of life: taking in and letting go. Inspiration and release. You can't expect to keep bringing new, fresh things into your life while hanging onto a pile of crap that needs to be released on the level of body, mind or spirit. There has to be room.

This rhythm isn't unique to us. It is happening throughout Nature in Autumn. What is valuable is being gathered and concentrated. What has completed its purpose is being released and composted. The tree does this in tree form. We do it in human form.

This is also why I expect to see all manner of Lung and Colon issues walking into my clinic during the Fall. The seasonal movement that we see happening outside of us is also moving through the body. And sometimes, we need a little help.

Supporting the Metal Phase this Autumn

Here are some very practical ways to consciously participate in this seasonal movement, realign yourself with it, and begin to experience yourself as Nature in human form.

Practice conscious letting go. Notice what feels finished and let it go. It may be something physical, emotional, or something about how you are living your life.

Allow grief to move. Autumn may bring old losses closer to the surface. Give them some room and breathe with them. Know that the intensity will fade with the season.

Practice mindful breathing. Bring awareness to the fact that you are receiving inspiration with every breath. Put three to five conscious breaths together at different points throughout your day.

Reduce excessive activity. The energy of Nature has reversed the tremendous outward expansion of Spring and Summer. Begin conserving some of your own attention and energy as well.

Harvest. Create order and boundaries. Simplify. Organize. Look at where your time and energy are going. Decide what has value, what you want to pull back on, and what you want to carry with you through the Winter.

Use the Large Intestine as a seasonal teacher. Notice where you are having difficulty releasing something that is already finished.

Protect against Autumn dryness. Foods such as pear, Asian pear, sesame, almond, and honey can be gently moistening, as can soups and porridges. If you are already showing signs of Lung dryness, be cautious with spicy, drying foods.

Use a little pungent (spicy) flavor to move Lung Qi. This can be particularly helpful in early Autumn, although too much pungent food can disperse Qi and aggravate dryness.

Pay attention to elimination. The Large Intestine releases what is no longer needed. Autumn is a good time to bring some conscious attention to healthy daily elimination.

Most of all, begin noticing the rhythm of inspiration and release, taking in and letting go.

As you incorporate some of these ideas into your life this Autumn, notice that the same intelligence moving in the trees, the plants, the birds, and the shortening days is also moving in you. We are not standing outside the season watching Autumn happen. We are participating in it.

We are Nature in human form. How is Autumn happening in you?